The Forks Academy
by Aaydona
Summary: What if Twilight took place at a boarding school rather than Forks and there are no such thing as vampires? An AU story about how Edward and Bella, Alice and Jasper, Emmett and Rosalie & co come together in a school filled with hypocrisy and drama.
1. Preface

The F. O. R. K. S. Academy

**Disclaimer: **_All characters belong to Stephenie Meyer, not me. Any weird general AU-ness or crimes against the Right Honorable Fandom of Twilight in this fic is all my fault._

**Preface**

He was in a panic, at the edge of his sanity, close to plunging into heady darkness. He ran, with an unearthly speed, towards her all the while knowing it was all his fault. All of this could have been avoided were it not for him. Death would have been a relief—a secret blessing in comparison to this…

Hell.

The wind lashed mercilessly at his colorless cheeks, his stinging, feverish eyes as he ran, never stopping for a gasp of air.

She had a lifetime of hopes, dreams, happiness before her like a sunlit road, and now it would end because of him. He had to get there on time. He would never forgive himself if he failed her this last time.

All he saw was her shattered image in the darkness.

---

**Very Important Author's Note:**

It's vital for you, dear Reader, to read this Author's Note so you can read this story without thinking the person who wrote this (me) is completely bananas. _The F. O. R. K. S. Academy_ is an Alternate Universe fanfiction about what should happen if _Twilight_ (which is owned by Stephenie Meyer, not me) was set in a boarding school (I'm so incredibly creative, right? Every fandom ought to have an AU boarding school piece), if there are _no_ vampires whatsoever in the story, and the Cullens and Hales are—mostly—human. This is going to be kind of a freeform monthly thing; I'm not going to be one those fanfic writers who take you in with a promising premise and completely give up on it later on and leave you hanging and all that. I can definitely guarantee one update per month and maybe more if the feedback's good ;)

I'm trying to keep this short, I promise. I'll try to make all the characters as, well, in character as possible, but basically, since Edward & Co are (mostly) human, they wouldn't have been alive for as long as they did in the book and will therefore be less mature though still "them" in essence. Also, due to their ages and the period of time they've known each other, all of the characters of _Twilight_ with the exception of Carlisle and Esme, are not "together" yet. I won't go down to the nitty-gritty stuff because hopefully all the elements in this fanfiction that are different from the source material will explain themselves in due time. Plus this is probably boring you.

Finally, without Stephenie Meyer and her book _Twilight_, this boarding school fanfic wouldn't exist. All the characters in the story (no matter how AU) belong to her and not me. The very vague concept of the F. O. R. K. S. Academy is mine, though the whole boarding school AU fanfiction concept definitely does not.

I hope you enjoy this! (I know _everyone_ says that, but seriously, I do!)

Yours Truly,  
_Aaydona (or Sky)  
_March. 10th, 2007


	2. Chapter One: Impressions

_The F. O. R. K. S. Academy_

**Chapter One  
**_Impressions_

The cafeteria felt isolated as the sun rose from behind wide windows. Rays of sunlight eventually penetrated the panes of glass and shot across the vast hall at the only rectangular table occupied at this early hour. Five teenagers with faces too young and solemn sat neatly on either side of the table, the young ones—a bronze-haired boy and a pixie girl—on one side and the older girl and boys on the other, eating in silence.

"Carlisle said there's going to be a new girl coming today," said the youngest girl, the one who had a mischievous sparkle in her eyes, like a pixie.

"And I suspect you know what she's like, Alice," the bronze-haired boy replied. Edward Cullen was his name.

"Bella Swan. She's really pretty, and pale, with brown hair and eyes," Alice described matter-of-factly, her gaze never torn away from Edward as she spoke.

The biggest boy of them all beamed, looking pleased with himself. "Pretty, huh? I prefer blondes though…" He glanced at the unbearably beautiful girl beside him, unearthly with the pale morning light cast over her golden hair and pristine features.

The girl rolled her eyes and said, "Oh my God, Emmett. You are incredibly nauseating." Seeing the thoughts swirling in her mind, Edward smiled to himself. He knew Rosalie was considerably more delicate on the inside than her icy front. In fact, right now Edward would say that the older girl harbored a secret soft spot for his brother.

"Incredibly nauseating—or incredibly _dashing_?" Emmett drawled, winking loudly back at Rosalie. Triumphant, he exchanged a high-five with Edward across the table.

His muscular body brushed against Alice's glass of apple juice gently as he leaned across the table to reach for Edward's hand, causing the cup to tilt over slowly… Edward sighed; for all his strength and guts, Emmett could be really careless sometimes. Luckily, Jasper caught the glass before it tipped over and spilled everywhere.

"Emmett you oaf!" Rosalie shouted, her thoughts voicing the exact opposite. _It's like watching a lover's quarrel_, Edward thought. His brother had the good graces to look reasonably sheepish and embarrassed.

Jasper shook his head sardonically as he set the glass back in front of Alice. "Now now… children, can't you all get along?" Edward grinned crookedly. Jasper usually didn't say much, but he usually had a good point when he opened his mouth.

Alice raised her newly rescued glass at Jasper's direction in a salute. "My hero."

"Monster, more like," Emmett retorted, snorting.

"Emmett… down, boy," Edward said to his brother, calmly.

"Woof, woof, Edward."

He could have smirked. Emmett could not deny, not to one who could see into his thoughts, that he was resenting being "rejected" by a cold Rosalie. Edward had more than a feeling that the two of them would eventually work things out, and therefore he couldn't be sure how much he should interfere with this, if he should interfere at all, though Emmett would most likely sulk to him about Rosalie nonstop again later, as if Edward didn't hear about her enough in his thoughts. Long sleepless nights, too many cases of Too Much Information, obnoxious thinking voices (_certain_ _people_ sounded incredibly loud and obnoxious in their heads). They were some minor setbacks that came with capturing every stray thought from everyone.

Jasper's mind, however, was harder to break into when the older boy guarded his thoughts, sealing them within stoic stone walls reinforced with unforgiving steel bars. It was not that Edward couldn't read his guarded thoughts if he really wanted to, though he was too thankful for one less perpetual voice intruding upon his silence to fully attempt his ability on Jasper, to trace the smooth endless walls of Jasper's hidden thoughts to find a crack to penetrate, to enter.

"What are you doing?" Alice was peering at him in a curious way, and Edward then realized his gaze had been focused directly at his long-empty food tray, unwavering, for too long.

Hastily he answered, "I was just thinking."

"I'm simply shocked. Brother Edward—thinking?" Alice pretended to gape in shock, but her act was shattered when she began to giggle uncontrollably.

"Maybe you should be one of those people who are professional thinkers—what are they called?" Emmett exclaimed. His large fist struck the table once in excitement, making a thunderous noise that echoed through the cafeteria.

The corners of his lips lifted. "You mean a philosopher?" His eyes crinkled in sudden mirth as Emmett shrugged, agreeing.

"It's like you read his mind!"

"Thank you very much, ladies and gentlemen." Edward bowed his head over the table modestly, his long fingers wrapped around a ripe apple, about to lift it to his lips.

The apple, crimson in his hands, contrasted with his pale skin the way blossoms of lifeblood looked against white snow, and his jaw, his fists clenched tightly shut. The apple rolled out of his grasp and fell to the ground. The empty _thud_ of the apple crashing to the floor was hollow. His breathing faltered.

"Getting clumsy with age, eh Edward?" Edward felt concern rising from Emmett's jaunty visage and felt new appreciation for his brother who was trying to make light of this even when deep down inside, he knew Emmett didn't understand though. No one could.

"Would you like my apple?" Jasper offered, an apple in hand.

Alice glanced at the golden-haired boy sharply. "Hey! That's my apple!"

Jasper then said, unfazed, "Would you like an apple, on behalf of Alice and me?"

"No, thank you… It's not the apple."

The bells rang then, the morning one that echoed through the entire school campus to announce the arrival of morning. Rudely. But to Edward the bells were almost musical, a canticle of silvery, clangy rings that entwined as one. It also prevented him from having to explain to Jasper and Rosalie what the apple triggered for him. The bells seemed to have brought the life back to the entire F. O. R. K. S. Academy, the kiss that broke the spell of isolation and awakened the Sleeping Beauty. The bells were assurance that he was here, at F. O. R. K. S., and safe and sound and not elsewhere.

But he could already hear the thoughts flying at him already in flurries of words and feelings as the other students woke up and began to prepare for another day in school. "Don't look so stricken," Alice said, patting his stiff shoulder comfortingly.

"Why shouldn't he? I would too, if all day _I_ am stuck in the heads of these—" A furious Rosalie was interrupted by Emmett, who stuck a silver spoon in front of her scowling face.

"Be tranquil… Rosalie Hale… Ohhhhmm… stare into your reflection and find tranquility and peace…" Emmett said in his best zen-master slash hypnotist voice, tapping his feet on the floor in an abstract rhythm.

Rosalie's scowl deepened on her beautiful face. "All I'm seeing is a big white smudge…" _Of course, trust Rosalie to seriously look at the spoon_… Edward thought smilingly.

"Nay!" Emmett leapt up from his seat and seized Rosalie's lily-white hand, striking an embarrassingly dramatic pose as he kneeled on one knee beside her. Jasper was watching the two with his arms crossed and lips curled wryly in a crooked smile, speculating what might happen next. "Fair maiden, thou is haughty but the moste fair of them all! I beseech thee to believe-eth that thy visage bears no resemblance to a white smudge!"

"Brownie point for the attempt at Middle English," Alice commented from the sidelines.

"I salute thee," Jasper said to the boy, raising a glass at Emmett.

Now all of their attention was directed at Rosalie. Her eyes were narrowed and her soft lips were twisted crossly. "Of course I don't think _I_ look like a white smudge! I was just saying there was milk on your spoon!" Her voice held a dangerous edge that bode ill for Emmett.

"Oh. Erm."

"That was somewhat anticlimactic," Edward finally said, matter-of-fact for he knew it was a misunderstanding all along. "It's like when you get terribly interested in a novel and find out in the end that all the characters die and it was all a dream, though I do no know how that would work exactly."

"_Edward_," Rosalie began, at last drawing her glare from Emmett. _Nobody cares_.

Alice's fingers were drumming against the wooden tabletop patiently. "Yeah. For the benefit for the rest for us, explain?" Jasper concurred with a nonchalant tip of his head and then, silently, took a long, hesitant sip of his coffee.

"It was nothing. Rosalie was just boasting of my utter magnificence, as usual," Edward answered innocently.

Rosalie rolled her eyes in reply and tossed her long golden hair back. Emmett's widened eyes shone with wonder at where the sunlight struck her face and gathered in a halo of light around her. _She's so beautiful_. And he could not believe she was not his—unbound like crisp drops of rain that slipped through his fingers when he grasped at them. Edward shuddered inwardly to break free from the hold of his brother's amorous thoughts, though it was so rare that someone had remained _not Emmett's_ for so long. He supposed it was rare that someone had remained _not Rosalie's _for so long as well, a smile in his eyes. "Well there isn't much magnificence to boast of, is there?" said Rosalie. Her long legs were crossed beneath the bench, so close to touching Emmett's that Edward could feel the crackling electric between the two.

"You wound me," he said back at her, uncaring.

"Mission accomplished. Let this be the day that I have officially proven my superiority over mankind. Note to self: Purchase silver plaque and matching silver dress." Her smile was brilliant, matching the radiance of the new sun, but so, so evil.

Though Emmett's interest was piqued at the mention of… "A dress, silver dress? Tell me more—"

Alice joined in cheerfully, "But see, Rosalie, do you have Edward's fantastical special ability? That is, the fantastical ability to…"

At that, both she and Edward rose from the table and announced, "Fold napkins into swans." A swan, one of those beautiful, elegant creatures.

"That's…"

"Brilliant, Jasper? Thank you, I knew you would understand me," Edwards was saying quickly.

"Yes, brilliant, we should all simply surrender to your… 'brilliance'?" There was an abrupt pause as the lanky boy choked on his coffee. It was dark as night in a porcelain cup, as if no light could penetrate the shadowy liquid. Dark as the lake of his gaze… Alice felt a sudden jolt inside.

"I think I actually like 'magnificence' better, y'know?" Emmett flashed everyone his trademark careless grin, eyeing Rosalie carefully "As in, 'the magnificence of a thousand rays of sunlight'."

Alice snickered loudly, fey-like in her mischief, and placed a tiny white hand on her heart. "You really are a poetic soul on the inside, aren't you?"

"Poet Emmett," said Rosalie, as if tasting the syllables on her lips.

"Stranger things can happen, right?"

---

"Hey Rosalie!"

Rosalie, hearing that deep, loud voice, stopped dead in her tracks. Students rushing to their first classes were air currents around her and she stood still as marble. Impatiently she asked, "What do you want, Emmett Cullen?" God. Him again, weaving through the crowds like hew as the center of the universe, face shining. She folded her arms across her chest defensively and tilted her head back.

She was frowning when he crossed the distance between them, a lopsided grin dangling over his lips. "Why…" he began to say, in between desperate gasps of air.

"Yeah?"

"Why won't you go out with me?" Emmett finished by giving her a puppy-dog-eyed look.

"Idiot."

People were gathering around them now, uncaring of being a couple seconds late to class if there was good gossip to be heard. Rosalie was made of stone that deflected nosy gazes with vehement glares, while Emmett seemed to be enjoying the attention he had garnered through his mad antics. _Damn exhibitionist_. But then, for just a flicker of a moment, she allowed herself to soften, for just a mere fraction, and peer at him truly. Yet she still could not bear to even think the thought of being together with Emmett… becoming reduced to nothing more than a beautiful doll for him to play with—just glass and porcelain and lace. It was bound to fail, and Rosalie would hate to fall.

"But _why_?" he demanded, his eyes penetrating while the pleading in his voice was heartbreaking.

Rosalie steeled her voice, her body for the final delivery of words. "Because I don't want to." Her tone wasn't snide or sharp or sarcastic but telling and sincere. She had intended to wound without wounding, to make him _believe_ with a final "truth".

And the blow struck him hard. He looked as though he was about to stumble back from her invisible impact, drop to the ground hard like bullet shells. She suddenly felt terrified of what might happen next, if Emmett should lose control of his inhuman strength. "I'm sorry," she mouthed, and tucked a strand of resplendent hair behind her ear, eyes lowered. Half the male population of F. O. R. K. S. sucked in their breaths.

Emmett didn't want to believe her. He didn't but he did, unable to wield his own beliefs. He couldn't let his smile waver or his good intentions turn sour: that wouldn't be him. He had to take this in stride. "It's fine," he told her, calm, not giving the crowd what they wanted.

An obnoxious teenage boy piped in, "Aren't the two of you related?" There was some shuffling and murmurs of agreement within the audience, realization lighting their faces.

Emmett forced himself to roll his eyes and groan too loudly. "Not _that_ again." When all the attention was turned to him expectantly, he explained, "We're both _adopted_. We both had different parents but we got _adopted _by the same adoptive parents."

"_Ohhh_…"

"Well, not that it matters now" he added, slightly regretfully. Rosalie didn't want him anyway. The crowd, enthusiasm deflated by the grim ending to the pursuit, soon scattered for class, leaving behind Emmett, and _her_. "I guess I'll see you 'round."

"Um. Yeah," Rosalie said before leaving him behind too. He kept hoping, wishing to himself that she would turn back to sneak a glance at him and then toss her golden waves of hair over her shoulder derisively, the way only she could, but she didn't turn back at all, not once. Sunlight trickled from the sky in bursts and cast abstract shadows over his bare, curled fists, its touch so lukewarm and unbearable. He was standing outside the school building, alone as the bell rang for class to begin. It screamed in his ears mercilessly.

So _that_ was why he hated mornings… He couldn't even remember whether he even hated mornings yesterday, but well, he did now. Anger took hold of him like steel cuffs without the keys and before he realized it, his fist slammed into the brick wall of the school building. He felt his fury released in the long cracks that extended from where he had punched the wall, the way the bricks fell away from the building like flaking paint, leaving a fist-sized hole on the wall—reminiscent of the rip in his heart.

"You'll get better."

Emmett turned around to face Edward. "Yeah?"

"Who knows better about the things you don't' know about yourself but me?" Edward said, consoling.

"But what do you know about liking someone, little brother? What about love, eh?" He dared the bronze-haired boy to answer in that all-knowing voice of his. Edward didn't.

"Care to instruct me on that matter?"

"You'll figure it out yourself."

For a moment the large boy emerged from his dingy hole of sulk to grin wolfishly, though he ended up looking like a bear leaving his cave instead.

---

The new girl had soft brown eyes that were washed over with warmth against light porcelain skin that was seemed so fragile Edward thought she might shatter, watching her over his filled lunch tray. He noticed that she sat, painfully uncomfortable, amongst the Lucky Seven, that her eyes weren't brown like the rough wood of the lunch tables, that her eyes seemed to be staring elsewhere, somewhere besides this large rectangular room with smooth white walls and wide windows leading to the campus beneath.

What was she doing there, sitting next to the Academy's wealthiest students, completely unaware of those ravenous wolves? She wasn't rich, he knew—the only reason Isabella Swan—called Bella—was enrolled at the F. O. R. K. S. Academy was because her father was the head of security here. She wasn't special until he wanted to search deeper than the absent expression pulled over her features and couldn't, at all. Then she became too elusive to be real to him, someone not rich, someone that doesn't _quite_ belong here, an illusion, even.

From what he'd gathered in his time here, only rich kids whose parents could afford the tuition and wanted them out of the way would be sent to F. O. R. K. S. It was the same with him—almost the exact same, only he was a freak amongst rich kids, too careful to truly form any ties of friendship outside his "family". Edward smiled grimly to himself though it was more a grimace than anything. A freak. That's what he was. Freak. Monster. Creep. Same difference. He had never been more aware of how out of place he was as he was when walled in by so many people and so many minds.

Suddenly self-conscious, he turned away from the girl and everyone but could not keep the rush of thoughts from reaching his brain. "Who _are _they?" he heard Bella Swan, the new girl, say through the thoughts of Jessica of the Lucky Seven, bitch that she was.

_Ugh. I can't believe she's asking about _them, Jessica thought._ Not that she'll stand a chance with any one of them._

A faint sort of panic seized him as his gaze touched with Alice's briefly and inevitably drifted to Bella's again. Their gazes held briefly, startling a single jolt that passed like quicksilver, and lowered at the same time, embarrassed.

Then Jessica's thoughts came to him swiftly again. She giggled. "The really hot one's Edward Cullen. He's, like, some rebellious musical prodigy or something. But gay. Totally gay. I mean just _look_ at him. Gorgeous, right? He can have _any_ girl he wants at a _boarding school_ but he doesn't because he thinks he's too good for everyone." Surprisingly, her thoughts actually what she had said with near perfection for once.

"Emmett's the one with the totally hot body. He's Edward's brother. Alice is their sister, with the weird hairdo. The other two are Jasper and Rosalie. They're all _together_."

As Bella paused to take all this information in, with his solemn gaze, Edward admitted, _No, I cannot read her thoughts, dammit_. Silently, the slight girl "with the weird hairdo" nodded and left the table, an unconscious grace in the spring of her light step, smiling.

He didn't need to read Bella's thoughts to guess what she was thinking: Edward Cullen, forever marked as "gay" and a "freak" on her mental ledger.

She replied to Jessica, "Together? Aren't they in the same fami—" _Incest_. He groaned inwardly, picking at his untouched food. Incestuous. She thought they were all insectivorous creeps.

"Oh no, not _that_ together! I meant they're in the same family, even though I wouldn't be surprised if they really were, _you know_."

Edward felt a shot of anger dancing through his nerves like pain. How _dare_ they pass judgment on him and his family? How _dare_ this girl—this Bella Swan somehow hide her thoughts from him, like it was some kind of obscure insult, while the rest of the world broadcasted their disdain for him openly? She shouldn't _deserve_ to be thinking about him if he couldn't figure out what her damn thoughts were. "Have they always gone to F. O. R. K. S.?" _she_ asked quietly.

Jessica was growing irritated at the slender girl's interest in them. And why were the boys staring at the new girl instead of herself? Pithy female thoughts of jealousy and male fantasies mingled with his own anger and frustration like blood, suffocating him under the sheer weight of the thoughts. Nonetheless, she answered, "I think they got kicked out of some school in Alaska or something."

A most profound sensation overtook him whenever his gaze skimmed the Swan girl's visage, laced with anger, and disdain, and something else that he could not quite understand. It was pain settled over his chest, it was poison working through his body, and he needed to be free of this—_feeling_ before he lost all control.

Edward, the perfect distraction to his own uncomfortable situation, was most profoundly amusing to Emmett. "What's with the sourpuss look?"

"What do you mean?" he found himself asking, glowering just a tad as his face lifted from his lunch tray.

"This." Emmett stared back at him, cross-eyed, and his handsome face was contorted eerily into some sort of evil, snarling monster-face. The large boy stuck his tongue out cheekily.

"Yes, that looks exactly like me…" Edward blinked awkwardly.

Rosalie unexpectedly took a pause from taking delicate bites of her lunch to add, "Great likeness."

"_Urumph_." Emmett, flushing beneath his white skin, emitted a soft sound that was the light whimper of a puppy. His focus shifted abruptly from brushing upon Rosalie back to his lunch. Edward wanted to say something, to end this delicate silence that has stretched over the three of them but held his tongue, telling himself that interference would only make things worse. After all, he wasn't even supposed to have the "ability" to begin with…

The two of them were thinking about one another, veiling their inner turmoil with blank faces that he wanted to rip off. _Is this Bella creature thinking about me_, he couldn't help but ask after watching Emmett and Rosalie. The question prodded him over and over until he wanted to smack his unopened carton of milk against his head to make it stop. "Awkward silence."

"Tell me about it," Emmett murmured darkly under his breath through his chewing, though it came out as something like, "_Well 'e ermou i_."

"What?" Edward pretended that he hadn't caught the thought, for politeness' sake.

But his brother merely rolled his eyes and said, "Pshaw."

Somehow everything would be all right. Edward wanted that. And if some banter-y, fairy-tale, completely brilliant thing were to happen to anyone, it would be Emmett. And mostly Edward didn't mind it, since he'd never been hopelessly enamored by a girl and he doubted a romance with a girl could ever work out, considering he could read every annoyance, every seed of distrust in her mind. _It would just hurt too much._ He dismissed thoughts of envy and regret with heavy reassurances that it wouldn't be worth the pain anyway.

His hands were twisted into nervous knots as he tried to think about the steps his fingers would have to take on ivory keys to make the piano sing the tune of his heart—a concerto, perhaps? An opera? The dramatic sharps and melancholic flats leading to bloody tragic finale, and dark velvet curtains descended upon the lone stage in mourning… He erased the image from his mind and hoped he wouldn't see that Bella creature again, because then there would be one Edward monster-face too many for any human to handle.

---

Alice stood in the hallway outside of the cafeteria, peering at Edward through the sheet of glass on the crude blue cafeteria doors. The walls here were painted a light ocean blue, reminding her of something pure and calming, like the way a little kid stared out at the world through fresh, innocent eyes, that she never really _got_. The floors were some kind of cheap speckled stone, hard and unfeeling beneath her feet. At least, _that_, Alice could understand. "Hey Jasper, did you know that Edward couldn't 'read' the new girl?" she said.

"Huh," he said in that quiet way of his. A single syllable of his expressed much more than just that, she'd learned, though she still could not fathom how much or how little she really knew about her "brother".

"Yeah. Absolutely nothing at all, just her alone. Mine works perfectly with her though. 'bout yours?" Alice elaborated, as if discussing something as trite as the weather instead of their unusual talents.

"Do you suggest," he drawled softly, "that I should try to charm and beguile her?"

She grinned, seriously considering this. "It might be fun," she concluded, arms folded across her chest gently. She rather liked this Bella Swan, but it might be fun to see how she might act around Jasper, just as a little revenge for making Edward hurt so much. "I suppose that would be a little evil? And Edward would probably spill all my dirty little secrets to the world if he finds out, and this girl probably has a crush on him already."

"Just a tad bit on the wrong side of the whole 'use our powers on the side of justice and goodness and rainbows and unicorns' bit." He ran, with ease, a pale hand through the soft hair that retained a sort of resplendence and smiled, almost sly. "I say, it's about time Edward met his match."

"If he's not too thick-headed to realize it. He probably thinks she's looking at him because she thinks he's _gay_ or something. Sometimes he just doesn't get what's going on inside of girls' heads—"

"Pun," said Jasper.

"Point." Alice sighed. It was surprisingly easy for comments involving _heads_, _thoughts_, _thinking_, _minds,_ and et cetera that related to her brother to turn into horrid puns. "But still. Boys _are_ so thoughtless. You should know."

"I suppose that brings us to the topic of Emmett, our romantic hero? Rumors are flying around about what led to his rejection this morning."

"Ouch. In front of half the school, too. Now all he can do is sit at the lunch table next to her because leaving would be a sign that he's not man enough to take rejection and actually making conversation would be, well, needy," Alice thought aloud, now twiddling her thumbs agitatedly. "If I were him, I'd just talk just because I'd be needy already."

But Jasper, much to Alice's annoyance, broke his calm and disagreed, "Speaking to someone who just practically _dumped_ you this morning is most likely not as easy as you make it sound, and there is too much lying for my taste. I think I would leave outright rather than to spew… _falsehoods_."

"But you wouldn't ever be in this situation to begin with," she said, quietly. "All you would have to is use your power and the girl'll be all over you again."

"But it's false—this power, it just affects the chemicals in your brain so you would think you feel things you wouldn't otherwise. It's based firmly on the power of falsehood. I—" Her friend froze.

_He hardly ever talks this much_, she thought to herself, frowning, afraid she'd touched upon something that was forbidden with Jasper. "Shows how much like Emmett _we_ are," she said dryly, trying to pacify things between them. "Now that's one person I would _hate_ to be right now. Stuck between a rock and a really beautiful hard place."

"Your becoming him would be—theoretically, quite impossible, or at least kind of weird, considering all the surgery you would have to undergo." He gave her a short shudder, his slender fingers tightening around his thigh and then gradually loosening the pressure again. She didn't quite know what to say to that and when in doubt, Alice always laughed.

---

Edward never really liked text-messaging to begin with (_why pay in order to be able to communicate with someone freely?_), and he was tempted to ignore his mobile phone when it vibrated in his pants pocket. He scanned the thoughts around him as a precaution before lifting out the phone and peering at it from underneath the table that he now shared with…

Bella Swan, who was staring determinedly forward, delicate features frozen.

_Hi Edward! Like your new neighbor lol? Bet all the boys r jealous._

Alice. She'd known this would happen all along, damn her! As if afraid the slender new girl could read his thoughts, he moved as far away from her as he could without falling out of the table, rigid as a corpse, and his fingers shuffled around on the keypad of his mobile phone for a reply.

_Yeah, 'she's really pretty, and pale, with brown hair and eyes'. Cheap shot._

_Admit it, I got u gooood this time :3_

_the last luagh will be mine_, he entered quickly, missing the feel of piano keys beneath his fingers even though the tips of his fingers grazed upon plastic only. He winced at his clumsy typo.

_What're you doing right now?_

_Trying to ignore you. I admit it, that was an understatement._

_You're probably trying desperately not to look at her right now, aren't ya? Ha, ha, ha. I'm laughing._

Straightening the arc of his back, Edward scowled, his hands curling into tight fists gripping the edge of the table, the feeling of the splinters of wood acute in his hands. _You are dead to me. I no longer have a sister_, he wrote back to her rapidly.

_Just embrace the unexpected :)_

_Ha_. It was not a triumphant laugh in the least—bitter to the core. When his gaze switched back to Bella Swan again he realized he was dying to speak to her but could not find the words to, would not allow her to speak to him and find out he was a freak, a monster, not normal. The teacher, at last, finished speaking and dismissed the class with a sweet relief Edward wanted. It would not come to him that day and yet the reprieve from temptations satisfied him for the moment. He rose from his seat as the bell rang—this time, without the harmony of the ones that morning, trying desperately to disregard the glint of tears in the girl's eyes.

He decided to send one last text message to Alice: _I've got to switch out of this class._

The office was full of dead air when he walked in, apparently breathless for some unknown reason. The receptionist glanced up from her morbid pile of papers sleepily as if he was a fresh breeze entering through an open window. He made himself wrap his nervousness around his limbs and walk up to the receptionist's desk. "Excuse me, I would like to switch out of my sixth-period Biology."

"It's a little late in the year to switch out now, hon—" Well-intentioned words, he knew they were, but not good enough.

"But I… have to," he pleaded, leaning into the counter unconsciously.

The large woman looked thoughtful for a moment, then said, "Do you have a serious reason for wanting a different time for the class?"

Edward could taste the refusal in her mind as clearly as the metallic taste of blood in his mouth, though he had to try. "There's this girl in Biology, and I can't be in the same class as her. I cannot become _educated properly_ while I am in that class, and do you want to be responsible for _wrecking my entire future_? How can I become a _pillar of society_ otherwise?" The words sounded insipid and limp to him, hanging around the dead air like dust mites.

"I know girls can be tough, sweetie, but it's all part of growing up," she reassured him slowly, figuring that the problem was some sort of dating thing.

The door opened suddenly. A girl entered the room, yet it was the other girl—the girl that was pressed against the back wall that caught his attention. _Not _her_ again_, he thought with loathing, a cold feeling sinking into his chest like sharp glaciers. He could feel her gaze on him.

"Never mind, then. I can see that it's impossible. Thank you so much for your help." He rushed for the door, nausea rising in his throat, and tried to wrench the thought of a third Edward monster-face out of his mind. And hoped that he had not made her cry for the second time today.


	3. Chapter Two: The Great Escape

_The Forks Academy_

**Chapter Two**

_The Great Escape_

It was early evening and Alice was bored. Bouncing on the edge of her seat, she looked to her right, outside the window. There was something beautiful about the immaculate lawns and twisting brick roads leading nowhere in the dark outside, all those little things people usually noticed about them veiled beneath shadows, flawless, with all the flaws hidden, like she wished to be. The stars and moon were concealed behind thick smudges of storm cloud overhead.

Suddenly she wanted very badly to leave the dimly lit cafeteria and wander into the night. "Everyone's really quiet today," she said softly.

"Yeah," Emmett replied, listless at the prospect of having to speak in front of Rosalie.

It was as though somebody flipped a switch from within Alice, and she was energetic again."You're reaaaaally boring, Emmett," Alice whined. "I blame you, Rosaliiiiiiiiiie." She was too bored to be tactful of the situation at hand, to notice the light and shadow flickering on the outline of the older girl's face when their gazes met. "And what is wrong with the cooks today? Fried eggs and bacon for _dinner_?"

Jasper lifted up a piece of greasy bacon with his fork delicately and said, "Nothing wrong with bacon."

"But for dinner?" Unable to raise only one, she raised both her eyebrows and prodded her eggs as though provoking a monster, unusually satisfied by the sight of yolk spilling over the egg whites like a acrylic paint.

"A conspiracy, I declareth!" he cried.

Alice heaved a long sigh as she answered, "These sad attempts at Middle English are becoming a long-running gag, Jas."

"At least they're not boring, correct?" His dark eyes were crescents of mirth when he lifted his head from his china plate. His face was a blurry still from a roll of film, unfathomable yet enough to express an entire world behind one look. Just to herself she wondered if it was the chemicals in her brain shifting in reaction to the older boy or something else that was trapping her in these odd feelings that cause her blood to burn in her ears. That was the Thing with Jasper, this spectacular, dazzling thing that he did to people's heads with an easy smile, a simple thought, and it was near impossible to tell whether the Thing was his special ability or just the effects of Jasper's own presence. Sometimes she couldn't tell whether he was even doing it or not.

"Ha, ha. I don't really think there're 'boring' bacon and 'interesting' bacon though… Like, would that be green or polka-dotted bacon?"

"That would be 'rotten bacon'," he told her. "Anyways, if you find everything around you boring, chances are _you_ are boring."

"I _am_ boring…" Alice gasped with no small amount of horror. Her fork dropped and struck the harsh white china, causing Edward to jump in alarm at the piercing sound and shake out of his reverie. _You, m'dear, are pathetic_.

"I resent that," Edward mumbled, yet she didn't catch the steely edge of his tone when she smirked.

"Eavesdropper," she grumbled.

"Fine, I'll pretend I didn't hear that," he snapped at her, anguish, sharp as a knife, cutting through his features. "I don't precisely _ask_ for this, you know!"

"Edward—" Jasper began. Alice was oddly touched.

"Seeing this girl, it doesn't have to be this… hard. If I were you, I'd—

"How much do you actually know about being me?" And the Thing with Edward was, nobody actually truly understood him, given the nature of his ability and burden.

She winced painfully, stinging eyes lowered in shame and arms twisted tight across her chest. _How dare I provoke Edward that way?_ She asked herself. _Impenetrable, constant Edward who doesn't like dragging other people into things?_ She wasn't bored anymore, but this was far worse.

"You don't know anything."

Alice's fists hit the wooden bench abruptly. "That's right. I don't. Except that _you're_ not even going to give this a try. _You're_ too afraid of the outcome, no matter how brilliant it can be." He couldn't _see_ like she could, that was a given, but it was too much for her to bear, watching him dismiss even the slightest chance at a happy ending that was possible.

"No, I _cannot _see. I cannot see how I can stop doing harm to the people around me, how a freak like me can possibly think to—I just can't. It is impossible."

"You are not a freak," Jasper said.

Her eyes watered but she simply did not care. The cafeteria was empty—most of the students, including Emmett and Rosalie, had exited the hall for their dormitories after finishing dinner, leaving behind a sea of silence that seemed to numb her heart. "No, _you're_ goddamn impossible, Edward." She thought he could hear her thoughts and read her mind, so why couldn't he understand her this time?

"I'm leaving." He stood up immediately, his arms pressed against his side to release the tension from the arch of his back. He couldn't—or didn't want to look at them any longer, Alice could tell. It felt like more, more than a simple twist of the body, when he turned his back to them to leave as though he was never returning again.

Jasper too rose from his seat with an unseen resolve, his wide eyes completely focused on Edward. "Where are you going?" he asked calmly, and Alice finally remembered that he was not her age. Older. Way more mature than she was.

"None of your business." _Anywhere from here_.

Edward shot him a furious glare from afar but Jasper met it unflinchingly. "I am older and far more rational than you at the moment, so tough beans." Jasper didn't think that "tough beans" was a particularly threatening to say to Edward, who was acting like a wayward child, but the mixture of irony and menace in his voice and height hardened its effects considerably. Edward and Alice could be so stupid sometimes, even though he could tell that they were both hurting now, seeing the fire under their skin, the shadowy eyes that were too large on their faces, the slight tremor of bony shoulders.

He knew he should calm them down using his ability. He couldn't do it. It wouldn't solve matters for more than five minutes. The situation would become tangled in more knots than ever for they will both become supremely pissed at him. _So useless without my ability_. Edward's reply was soundless; he gave the boy a "what are you going to do about it?" look in his haunted black pupils. "You're not going anywhere without telling me." _You little punk_.

"Edward, can't you tell we care about you—omigod, that's so cliché—I mean, you don't have to run away for things to get better—you're _not_ a freak," Alice stammered through hysterical hiccups. "Everything's coming out all wrong, like from some cheesy nostalgic Lifetime movie, but it's true. You're not a freak, running away is wrong, and we—or at least _I_ care about you, if you don't think anybody does." A slight pause, and a moment of realization flitted through her features, a shooting star that couldn't be caught. "We'll help you. Whatever you want."

"I want to leave," Edward told her, enunciating every word painstakingly.

"Meet me at the school garage after ten."

---

The plan was simple. He knew what it would be before Alice did. _There is no reason for _the Plan_ to fail_, Edward said to himself, taking a quick scan of the room he shared with Emmett and Jasper. The walls were painted a pale dusky color and the space felt empty, bare from the lack of clutter aside from a single wall covered by shelves and shelves of Cds. His feet felt unsteady atop the thick golden carpet as he picked up a plain black backpack and dropped a couple pieces of spare clothing into its depths. He as shaking from a shot of nervous energy, wanting to burst through the large window that was the far side of the room and breathe the fresh air of the night forest.

"You lunatic, Edward. You haven't even said a word to her and she's already got you twisted around her finger." Emmett was sitting on a black leather coach, waiting.

"That's coming from he who stalks Rosalie," Edward replied, bitter. "That's why I'm leaving, is it not?"

"The million-dollar question is whether that's your only reason?" Emmett was in a wise big-brother mood. _God I hate that_, Edward thought. _And he knows it._

His stance shifted uncomfortably. "Yes that's all," he answered briskly. He thought about that Bella creature, and the way his gaze practically terrorized her. He couldn't see the thoughts behind that beautiful pale mask and the brown eyes but he wanted to, unknowingly. "Look, I do not know why she's doing this to me. Is it love at first sight? I don't know that, or if she even gives a whit about what I think of her at all. It is not a simple thing I can explain—her scent, her face—all of this is more complex, better, and infinitely worse."

---

"I saw myself doing this, you know. Ugh, stupid me—I walked right into my own vision," Alice groaned. "So. Do you have any idea what the Plan is?"

"Did you not tell Edward you already conceived it?" Jasper was slightly puzzled yet unruffled.

"The Plan was to have you get in here and help me plan," laughed she, eyeing Rosalie hopefully for aid. "Open discussion."

The golden-haired girl rolled her eyes. "Anything to rid Edward of this stupid infatuation." Jasper nodded his agreement.

"Are you kidding me?" Alice exclaimed, wondering how on earth could they both be so unfeeling. _This anger does _not, she thought, _have anything to do with Emmett_. "It might be his chance at, you know, love! And you want us to throw it away for him? Don't you know he can't hear her thoughts? It's perfect."

"Perfectly over romanticized," Jasper drawled while it was Rosalie's turn to nod. "These things do _not_ occur like that. What is this, a romance novel?"

Alice was horribly tempted to lift a hardcover book from her shelf, toss it at his head, and show him what a romance novel is, though something told her that would be unwise. "Fine, we'll agree to disagree," she replied coldly. "It's about what Edward wants, isn't it? Well, he wants to leave, so let's just let him figure it out on his own that way."

"That's a stupid Plan."_ Stupid Rosalie_. _Stupid Jasper helping his sister._ Why couldn't he just shut up, as usual?

"Got a better one, your royal highness? A tyrannical one that involves bullying Edward into submission?" she shot back, practically seething. She knew she would regret jilting the older girl later, when Edward would be gone and they were alone in the dorm room they shared. It was like the girl was destroying everything she believed in—Emmett, romance, and now Edward too. Not Jasper though; he was never hers to begin with.

Jasper blankly said, "Fine."

Alice sounded surprised when she repeated, "Fine?"

At last, Rosalie too concurred, "Let Edward decide. Let him drive god-knows-where. I can't believe I'm serious about this."

"That makes two of us," Alice said to her, overcome by a strange feeling. On her bed, she hugged her knees to her chest and braced herself for what was to come, watching wide-eyed as swirls of color swept away her present, the vibrant clouds parting like curtains to reveal. _A dark Volvo speeding down the lonely gray road, slicing through the darkness with deadly urgency. Thick trees bushes pressed upon the low metal fencing and dampened the air. She saw the usual green road signs half-veiled in the night. She had met this sight before, many, many times and she wasn't surprised by Edward, whose hands gripped the steering wheel tight in a suffocating rage and whose sense of direction was still shockingly accurate._

Rosalie and Jasper were staring at her curiously, but they knew better to interrupt. "Alaska," she stated softly though she did not need to.

Jasper shrugged nonchalantly. "Better than running down to Mexico."

"What?"

"Why would Edward go to _Mexico_?" Alice said at the same time.

"My point exactly." He grinned, as if he had just untangled a series of intricate knots, triumphant. "Okay, as for the Plan… We should keep this simple. Our goal is to get to Edward's car, which is locked in the school garage, unnoticed. Now from what I've gathered, our dutiful School Head of Security possesses a copy the key in his office."

Her hands laced contemplatively on her lap, Alice smiled because this was definitely going to be an interesting account. "Your talent will come in handy, Monsieur Jasper. What if there is a mysterious intruder running around and making girls _faint_—"

Rosalie interrupted, "You're going to have to be the fainter. I doubt any authoritative figure will believe any tale you tell them."

Alice sighed most dramatically. "So be it. The sacrifices I'm willing to make for dear Brother Edward. Are you up for it?"

Jasper was frowning faintly, his lanky body slightly awkward leaning against the wall in the dim lamplight as he contemplated this. Alice knew he didn't like using his ability to manipulate people's minds easily any more than she liked picking up on the future, only she was the one who couldn't help doing it and he refused to wield his ability. Her nervous hands wrung her sheets, twisted into a shape as complicated as one's inner feelings, the kind usually hidden away from most people. _Please please please_, Rosalie pleaded with her pout. Finally, his head tilted back in exasperation and a faint flush that contrasted with his pale skin colored his cheeks. _Fine_.

"Oh yay!"

---

"Where're you goin'?" Emmett inquired tauntingly when Edward slung the full backpack over his shoulder a little awkwardly. Whatever he might be to the rest of the world, Edward did _not_ seem like a backpack type of guy to Emmett.

The younger boy laughed uneasily and ran a hand through his disheveled hair. "They told me to meet them in front of the school garage after ten. It's all part of 'the Plan'." To further emphasize the point, he patted the backpack gently and looked back at his wall of CDs out of the corner of his eye longingly. "I couldn't get a very clear picture of the Plan from her though… Odd."

"I can punch a hole in the garage door for you if the Plan doesn't work out," Emmett offered hopefully, smiling at the thought of what hijinks Alice might as part of her Plan. "Infinitely more efficient than using a key, y'know."

"No, Emmett, no. And you call me a lunatic for avoiding the Bella creature? It would be very suspicious tomorrow morning when my car's gone and there's a hole on the side of the garage."

At the mention of "the Bella creature", Emmett began laughing hysterically. "What—the—hell?" he wheezed through choking laughter. Edward in turn looked unbelievably uncomfortable at his amusement, blanching until he was white as parchment. "Where are you going anyway, to avoid this—Bella creature?"

"Mexico," he deadpanned.

"Awesome."

"It's back to Alaska, actually," Edward told him, grinning a bit.

Disappointment made its way down his throat like burning alcohol and sank to the pit of his stomach. "_Why not Mexicoooooo_?" Emmett whined doggedly. "Dude, the Denalis are as fun as a pile of old books with the funny words scratched out. No fun whatsoever."

"That's an interesting simile. Now what time is it?"

"Nine forty-five," replied Emmett without glancing at the plain clock on the wall, softly ticking, at all.

---

"Don't look so grim," Jasper told Rosalie as the three of them snuck out of the girls' dormitory, the dewy grass beneath their feet whispering a warning. She glanced at the surface of her silver watch, cool around her bare wrist, glittering from the glare of her flashlight, and her reflection was a beautiful disapproving visage leering back at her. She shivered unpleasantly in the cold when her skirt fluttered from a northerly wind.

"How can I not?" she said bluntly, trying to make him feel as uncomfortable as she did. "Stupid damn cold."

"I'm kind of surprised you even agreed to it." Alice's voice appeared out of nowhere, like the pixie she seemed to be. She had an unearthly glow around her shock of white skin, almost magical while her choppy dark hair blew in every direction and she seemed a thing of the wild. Pity about the hair though.

"Well the two of you'll muck it up without me. Scratch the m and put an F and what do you get?" Rosalie didn't know if the two of them could see her smirk in the dark but it didn't really matter that much.

"Same difference," Alice retorted. "I'm even kind of surprised you're not having second thoughts about the Plan. It feels like we forgot something but I don't really know what." Though she would never admit it, Rosalie had the same feeling as she tread upon the moist grass, out in the dark when she should be resting, her blood surging when she should not care, ever, at all. "Gah!"

"Hmm?"

Rosalie wrinkled her brows. "Eww. That is so unbelievably disgusting I don't have a word for it."

"What she said," said Alice, taking several steps backwards in stride. "Oh my—"

Jasper flicked his flashlight on swiftly, shining the light on the spot. "Oh that?" he inquired, a wisp of a sneer inflecting his tone. The harsh light made sharp glimmers on the creature's brown shell, so strange nested in crisp not-too-tall grass on its side. One of its feelers was lopsided as if drooping in defeat while the rest of it practically sagged, limply, into the ground. "Well hello, Monsieur Snail," greeted Jasper.

"Shut up, ignore the thing, and let's go," Rosalie hissed, unnerved by the snail. _What is wrong with my brother?_ It wasn't as if snails and slugs were particularly _uncommon_ in this universe, and it _did_ rain here at the FORKS Academy.

Alice's voice was high and strangled when she said, "Come _on_, Jas. _It's a creepy snail_. Ew ew ew."

"Does it frighten you?"

"Only to no end." Rosalie managed to keep most of the hysteria out of her voice, determined to keep her gaze on something other than the snail.

They kept walking until they reached the far end of the school campus. There was a dim light, diminutive as the luminance of a firefly, coming from a small window mounted on an office near the school gates—the Head of Security didn't leave campus until after eleven, because _of course_ all the kids who'd wanted to sneak out would be asleep by then.

Jaspe unthinkingly picked a rock up off the ground, measured its weight in his hand, and threw it at the window. He saw the light bleed into the darkness after the glass shattered with a loud crack. "Yes!" he murmured in triumph, as Rosalie rolled her eyes, unimpressed by her brother's willingness to be impressed.

From faraway she could see the creaky wooden door of the office swing open, smirking when an angry man stormed out of the shack-like establishment with a flashlight. The unexpected burst of light stung her eyes, but she realized this was well worth the minor discomfort when Charlie Swan's complexion rose to a vivid sort of purple she liked in clothes. "Run!" Alice whispered fiercely, even though there was no way Jasper could have heard her anyway.

As Rosalie had suspected, rather than running in the direction from which Jasper had thrown the rock, Charlie Swan marched up to her and Rosalie instead. She began explaining before the man had a chance at interrogation. "Mr. Swan—Alice and I, we saw this weird guy sneaking around campus at night, so we just decided to follow him—he was going really slow at first and we had like no idea where he was going or if he's even a he at all—and then report him to you and stuff—"

It was Alice's turn to speak. "Then he came here, after circling the entire Academy really carefully, and…"

Mr. Swan nodded along impatiently and said, "Be careful and return to your dormitories immediately. I'll go after him."

"B-b-but… what if he decides to go after us?" Rosalie's lower lip trembled and she widened her eyes to innocent perfection, an abundance of laughter bottled up inside of her. "He's obviously very violent." And obviously Charlie Swan was unskilled at managing silly teenage girls.

The older man, a heavy flush still beneath his skin, looked so awkward Rosalie almost felt sorry for the hell he was going to go through following Jasper, who could probably keep the ruse up all night, leading the security guard to every corner of the Academy without revealing his identity. "It's… going to be, erm, fine. The intruder just broke a window…"

"Yeah, I'll protect you…" Alice reassured, snickering.

"F-f-f-fine," Rosalie stammered on purpose.

"I'll leave the two of you to it then." The uncomfortable man then left them in pursuit of Jasper and all they could hear were rapid footsteps rustling the grass in the dark.

Now it was their turn. The two girls, eyeing the open door to Charlie Swan's office, laughed in unison. "Mission accomplished."

"You didn't even faint," accused Rosalie, glancing at Alice, disgust and fondness mingling in her gaze.

"Didn't need to. I'm saving the fainting for another time."

---

The school garage was built from the same bricks that all the other buildings of the academy were made of. In the absence of light, the reddish brick walls seemed duller, closer to the quality of dirty prison barriers than building materials for a boarding school for rich kids. The metal gate, a mass of black, twisting, curling bars, kept all the students' cars within its confines at night, when all of Fork's teenaged students were asleep in their dormitories. Or at least all of Fork's teenaged students should be asleep.

Two boys that should be asleep stood outside the gates, peering wistfully at a sable black Volvo with sleek, elegant lines next to a Jeep. The taller one was humming incessantly, twiddling his thumbs out of boredom, while the other just stared ahead as his brilliant eyes darted back and forth in the dark space.

"Do you think they'll actually come?" Edward wondered, glancing back and forth from Emmett to the premise of the school garage. "It's getting late."

"Why Edward, are you afraid of the dark?" It didn't really surprise him that Emmett was going to make a taunt out of this.

He rolled his eyes dryly. "Why yes, you got me there. But seriously, where are they?"

Emmett shrugged as if he hadn't a care in the world. "No idea." He halted to narrow his eyes into a squint at the distance. "Wait… I think I see them."

Now that surprised Edward. Truthfully he didn't really expected Alice to come through with something like this. The keys jangled, tuneless but full of promise, and glittered like crumpled tinfoil as they flew from Alice's hands across the air and landed at his feet.

"What happened to Jasper—and aren't these Mr. Swan's keys?" He felt the words leave his throat before he knew fully what was happening.

"Yeah, well Jasper's keeping him company," answered Rosalie, knowing that she did not need to, really. An oddly comical and distorted picture of a golden-haired boy running at top speed and the older man going after him like a hound came to Edward startlingly. He couldn't resist a smile.

"Huh. Fascinating."

Alice furrowed her brow thoughtfully. _I hope Jasper don't get caught or anything._ Her concern made Edward feel more uncomfortable than he thought it would, because again he was trespassing into her thoughts, where he had no right to dwell.

_Pick 'em up._ He didn't know whose thought it was anymore. He had spent his life trying to live freely within the set of rules that framed his actions, torn from want and anger and need and music. Should he take them, take them and go to a place that would clear his thoughts regardless of the consequences? The night stretched on and the silence lasted and Edward did not know when all this would end.

In small, cautious movements, he bent down and held the keys in his hands…

The engine was purring smoothly when he fastened his seatbelt, gazing at Alice, Emmett, and Rosalie from the rearview mirror. They would be there when he returned, along with a whole crapload of troubles and consequences and that Bella-creature.. but he wouldn't think of that right now. The gates were as wide open, and smiling vaguely, Edward placed his hands on the steering wheel, driving through the imprisoning gates without stop.

---

Jasper ran slowly into the wooded area of the school until he grew bored of Swan never quite reaching him and wanted to watch from above in a tree to pass time. Could he?

He realized his overconfidence was catching up to him when he saw the security guard's bright flashlight shooting through the trees' dark forms, threatening to reveal his hiding place against the gnarled roots of a great tree. _Jasper Hale, you idiot._

He had to make a quick decision. If he ran now, the light would touch him and show the man who this "intruder" really was. _Oh damn_, he thought as Mr. Swan suddenly ran closer and closer to his spot, shouting, "Come out here right this instant!"

Jasper scrambled to pull himself up a branch that swooped low from the trunk, then rising to branch after branch, level after level powered by adrenaline-fused agility. The security guard now knew of his position. He told himself he couldn't get caught. Anxiety made his limbs clumsy and slick with perspiration when he practically escalated within the tree. He reached out to get a grip on a thick branch nearby, at the edge of the tree, and as he began to lift himself up, it snapped in a loud crack.

Then he was in the air. For a couple seconds it felt like flying, this freedom of arms and legs and sight, but he knew he was falling, slowly descending in the darkness…

---


	4. Chapter Three: Painfully Obvious

_The F.O.R.K.S. Academy_

**Chapter Three  
**_Painfully Obvious_

Jasper's fingertips grazed the cast put over his left arm tenderly as his eyes stared straight ahead at Charlie Swan. It was early morning now and he'd gotten no rest between being discovered by the older man, rushed to the hospital to treat his broken arm, and rushed back to the Academy—just in time for punishment. Glancing at Mr. Swan and hearing the shuffling over paperwork in a sharp-lined cabinet, Jasper was vaguely reminded of a time from when he was a child and believed he could leap out from the uppermost branch of a tree and soar with his arms spread like a bird in the air as a child. He actually took the leap the day after he turned six and became his parents' "tough little boy". He sensed the same familiar sense of failure, the same sterile hospital scent lingering in his clothes long after he'd left.

"Don't you ever get sick of meeting me here, Jasper?" asked Mr. Swan, a sigh in his voice.

"Well, the interior decoration of your office is so lovely, Mr. Swan," he answered, shrugging as he straightened his posture from a slump.

The man's temper rose into the air like damp fog from the surface of a bleak lake. "Look, Hale. If you don't keep that smart mouth of yours shut, I'll have it shipped out of here before you can make another comment."

He yawned slowly. "Yup, the often-feared good-cop bad-cop routine."

"You've got a whole lot of trouble ahead of you, but I guess you know that from experience."

"Understood," Jasper said, adding a, _as if I didn't know it_, mentally. "I made my choice."

Arms crossed tight over his chest, the man fiercely asked, "You made your choice all right, but you know what I wish?"

"That you were paid more?"

"That's true, but what I'm referring to at the moment are your _choices_. Of course you'll do what you want and make your own choices; that's the way all teenage boys are. But do you ever ask yourself whether your choices are the best you can make?" Mr. Swan's features were grave, carved of the hardest obsidian, as Jasper listened to what he had to say, interested in spite of himself. This was not something the man would say in their customary banter during their run-ins; this was _serious_ and its gravity fazed the boy.

"The _quality_ of one's choices depends on the eye of the beholder," he retorted lamely, though in the meantime actually wondering if it was all for naught of Edward hadn't gotten away.

"You can't tell," Mr. Swan responded dryly.

"Did I stutter?" snapped Jasper, slightly impatient.

"You're the beholder. They're _your_ choices, and if you can live with them without feeling bad about it later, then you've done what most people devote their lives into doing." Charlie Swan surprised him sometimes even when using the simplest of words.

_Choices_.

_Can you really make one so pure that you feel no regret or shame in the aftermath or hurt another person?_

Through the blinds he could see that outside, the sun was climbing over the horizon reluctantly, bathing the planes of the Academy in blood-red light, an oddly beautiful occurrence that somehow escaped him every morning. His hands felt numb gripping the side of his chair but he ignored it, choosing to close his eyes instead and wait for the cold to drain from his body.

"What is this, philosophy class? I can hardly think straight at four o'clock in the morning to give you a more coherent answer than 'I just don't know'. I don't know how my choices affect other people. I don't know if I would feel bad if I made a bad choice. What if I don't feel regret after _killing_ someone? Does that make it a good choice? Would I be a good person?"

"All I'm saying is that you think about it, Hale."

---

"Do you think he's okay?" Alice said to Rosalie, almost timidly, after they both got dressed. It was funny how Jasper may have been the calmest, most confident of them all and yet she was worried about him, afraid that he got caught in a moment of carelessness.

The older girl ran her fingers through her hair wearily, dazzling eyes too bright with fatigue. "I wouldn't worry about him if I were you," she replied, a knowing sort of secret smile skimming her lips playfully. "He can easily get out of any trouble with that skill of his—that is assuming that he _got_ into any trouble to begin with."

Alice went into a whirlwind of incoherent thoughts, nervous hands tangled in her sheets. "What if he _did_? What if he _did_ and decides not to use his powers for things that are neither good nor evil? What if he _dies_ from boredom while speaking to Mr. Swan, _huh_? You haven't thought about that, _have you_?"

Rosalie narrowed her eyes in a slightly hostile manner. "Have you—"

"Ha! Point for Alice!" said Alice, quickly.

The older girl took a deep breath as if to collect herself, lips tightened into a tense line. "Pardon me, but you seem to have misplaced your _brain_ somewhere last night."

"Sorry, I'm just weirdly worried for some reason. Augh, I think the lack of sleep is getting to me."

Suspicious, Rosalie said, "You are strangely worried about Jasper… You don't… do you?"

"Wow, you didn't get much sleep either, did ya?" Alice pointed out brightly, brows knitting in a faint frown. "I have no idea what you're talking about. I don't what?"

"You like him," she declared.

Alice nearly did a double take at the other girl's unexpected statement, and at her own startling reaction to it. She didn't like to be shocked, preferring to remain the one who _does_ shock at all times, and certainly not by Rosalie, whose perfect, angelic features were easier to take without knowing there was a soul and perhaps even some wisdom beneath the skin-deep beauty. And her, his sister of all people. "Should I deny it and wave it away?" she inquired, a little enigmatic. Or should she admit it, admitting that she did not feel as indifferent as she had convinced herself, baring her innermost thoughts for the prying eye?

Rosalie chose to be philosophical in her response. "Whatever you want. I can't push you into a fate you do not wish for yourself."

"Yes you can," Alice reminded her, lightly.

"Yeah, you're right, but still. Talk about _gross_, you weirdo. Jasper, like, seriously?" She shuddered at the thought of it to better indicate her complete disgust, making Alice stick a tongue out back at her.

"It just so happens that Jasper is your brother, and that pretty much guarantees that you'll find him reaaally revolting at any given time, not that you'll give anyone with a penis half a chance, of course. Secondly, he's not that bad as boys go. Thirdly, _he's your brother; therefore you're not supposed to find him attractive in any shape or form. _Also, I think gross is too generalized a term, and did I mention Jasper's your brother?" Alice felt oddly indignant about what Rosalie had said, and she was babbling though she had no reason to and could not stop it. She was overcome with something strange, just as strange as the uncanny abilities that she and her siblings possessed though infinitely deeper.

"I would say it's a tad late for you to deny it and wave it away now."

Remembering Emmett's crestfallen face from the day previous suddenly, Alice replied, "Oh what do you know."

"Tsk, tsk. You're so painfully obvious sometimes." Rosalie knew exactly what Alice was thinking and withheld a sigh to herself, frustrated by her own predicament—how did Emmett Cullen, this boy—almost a man—who was as shallow as she was icy, manage to irritate her even when he wasn't around? No, she refused to think about him any longer, turning her attention to the alarm clock half-hidden under her pillow. "We still have so much time before breakfast starts," she murmured partly to herself, unaware of the quizzical looks Alice was casting at her.

She shivered when her bare feet touched the sudden cold of the uncarpeted floor as she approached the desk where her laptop sat. Drips of light fell into the room through the sharp blinds and misted glass, creating a play of shifting daylight on the sleek surface of her cherry-red laptop.

"Whatcha doin'?" Alice peered over her shoulders curiously. "You don't have any homework that you'd want to do. You're not planning to go on _MySpace_ or something, are you?" The tone of her voice rose to a panic-filled octave as her lips formed the word _MySpace_.

"Yes, I'm exchanging dirty emails with this thirty-year-old man living with his mother in Utah, actually. He's _sooo_ manly," Rosalie retorted. "We're planning to elope as soon as he gets that job he wants at the local McDonald's."

Alice played along blithely. "You only love him for his free employee discount at McDonald's, don't you?"

"Of course not! Whatever's in those fries will get me too fat! Now leave me alone."

She was sure of what she was going to do, finally for once. She lifted the screen promptly, with a patience usually lost within her, waited for the programs to load. And she began to type.

And of course, her plan was doomed to fail, her concentration splintered by the booming pounds on her door. Rosalie shook out of a deep reverie. "Who is it?" Alice cried.

"It's your dear long-lost brother Emmett 'The Man' Cullen!"

"Don't open the door," Rosalie mouthed to the other girl, seeming cautious. Her gaze slipped from the computer screen to the door.

Alice responded to the intruder by saying, "How do I know you're who you say you are?"

Rosalie thought she heard a derisive snort even a layer of solid wood could not muffle. "My undeniable flair and brilliant charisma are great indicators." She rolled her eyes in disbelief. Or actually, complete belief, for whom but for Emmett Cullen could account for such a _huge_ ego?

"What's Edward's favorite animal?"

Laughingly he answered, "Easy. Mountain lion! A point for the man!"

Her next question was, "Damnable point. Where d'you think Edward is right now?"

"Mexic—just kidding, Alaska. Denali."

Alice had no choice but to let the silly oaf in. Emmett stood, dazzling, in front of the doorway, a pale smirk tinting the curve of his lips. "'ello, fair maidens!" he greeted cheerfully. "Now now, don't just sit there in awe of my magnificence. You're making me blush."

"How did you manage to get in? The dormitories are locked until five-thirty," Rosalie said calmly, biting the inside of her cheek to trap her grin.

"Punched a hole in the wall. That's what real manly men do. We punch holes in walls with our many fists and muscles of power to reach our destinations. Even a great wall will cower in fear before me, afraid I will punch a hole within it due to my great prowess."

"How unfortunate for walls, with manly dunces always punching them in anger and whatnot," she commented dryly, crossing her arms in a calculating manner. She wondered why he was here, all dashing and shining and _Emmett_, after the fiasco yesterday, and why they haven't discussed it despite the painfully obvious rift it metamorphosed into between them. She didn't want to start thinking about the problems between them right at that moment, preferring to enjoy the pleasantries while they lasted and letting her lips curl in a hesitant, natural smile.

**---**

**A typed list of **_**Reasons Why Jasper Hale is Not The Guy For You**_**, by Rosalie Hale. Found mysteriously taped inside the locker of Alice Cullen.**

_Reasons Why Jasper Hale is Not The Guy For You_

_by Rosalie Hale_

_1. He likes snails.  
__2. He can cheat on you and blame it on his "natural charm."_  
_3. He dressed up as a Confederate soldier for Halloween. Lame!  
__4. Two words: Blood fetish. Can't get him to stop talking about blood during science classes.  
__5. He's way too tall for you. It'd be really hard to kiss. Ok. Ew. I'm thinking about him kissing… Bad images.  
__6. Tons of incest jokes to be made here.  
__7. Those "walking on clouds of happiness" feelings might be unnatural.  
__8. Worst tree climber in the universe.  
__9. He _thinks_ he's such a hotshot baseball player.  
__10. He likes another girl._

---

Alice crumpled the sheet of pale pink paper into a ball and threw it into the top shelf of her locker, determined to let the shadows veil the list from all human eyes. She didn't really know what to think, though the knowledge that Rosalie highly disapproved of this, just like how she disliked the idea of Edward and "the Bella creature", was like a sickly feeling on her skin. The metallic _clang_ of the locker door slamming sounded muted to her ears, as if real life was fading fast from all around her. The knowledge constricted her lungs. Her fingernails were digging into the palms of her pale hands with all the force of her paranoia and anxiety until she saw the crimson of blood on her hands and unclenched her tight fists.

She didn't know whether to be furious at Rosalie or to appreciate the concern. She didn't know if she should dispose of the list. She didn't even know where Jasper was but wanted to.

Alice only wished Edward was here so he could help her or at least make her feel better as soon as she saw how much worse his problems were. She didn't know what to do.

_Where is he?_ She hadn't seen him since last night. She envisioned the pale, angular face and that indescribable expression that always lurked beneath the darkness of his eyes. She remembered the jaunty grin he flashed at her, during the handful of seconds before the rock he threw penetrated the glass window.

It had felt special, somehow, and she didn't want it to go away.

_10. He likes another girl._

"I _knew_ this was going to happen, I _saw_ this was coming, so why did I make the stupid choice and pick _him_ out of all people?" she whispered with an abundance of anger delivered at herself.

---

Minutes, hours Jasper were never really aware of passed before he spared any awareness to reality again.

"The principal wants to see you," Mr. Swan announced, carelessly, reverting back to the stereotypical security guard after his solemn previous conversation with Jasper. He was looking at Jasper with a kind of grudging respect, an impressed glint in his gaze that Jasper detested. He detested how people seemed to like him even in the worst of all moments, simply because of his indifference, his _ability_.

He hated himself for being this way, doubting all the things life had bestowed upon him unconsciously when others could ask for little more. Yet the metallic taste of bitterness lingered like blood on his tongue. He didn't deserve all that he had. "Alright," he said austerely, even though being _all right_ was the farthest thing from his mind. "And do you know why it took so long?"

"He's the principal of a prestigious and privileged Academy, Jasper. He's got stuff to do."

Jasper knew he wasn't going to learn more about what the principal was doing, so he stiffly said, "Fine."

As he, defeated, rose from his seat and turned to enter the principal's office, Mr. Swan said, "Why are you wearing your shirt backwards?" The older man gestured at Jasper, who had a straight line of buttons running down his white-clad back. _God._ He couldn't imagine something this absurd happening to Alice, or Edward, or Rosalie (though Emmett, perhaps, only he would take it much more lightly).

He toyed with his collar before replying, "The front of the shirt's kind of a mess from the fall."

The other merely shrugged quizzically. "To each his own."

Jasper gave the warden a saluting raise of the eyebrow and, adjusting his shirt uncomfortably, left him behind for the principal's office.

He was greeted at the door. "Why hello, Mr. Hale. We meet again."

Principal Carlisle Cullen sat before him, sharply perceptive in a dark suit that was perfectly fitted at the shoulders. He was smiling with his angel's face, his keen gaze revealing a degree of experience deeper than his ageless appearance suggested. But it was still impossible for Jasper to think of the man as anything other than Carlisle, the man who adopted them all.

There were large, wide windows installed in the office, revealing views of the outside that looked like vibrant photographs of light and memory framed by dark mahogany wood. There was a flicker of Carlisle's shadow across the office's cream-colored walls, and dry-mouthed, Jasper started, "Erm. So."

"Quite a fascinating night you've had, Jasper. Is your shirt bac—"

"Yeah, it's backwards 'cause the front's kind of a mess. Real fascinating, I know," he interrupted quickly. Sometimes adults could be so repetitive, like hearing an echo ring in his ears over and over again. "Okay. Niceties over."

"Let us try to maintain the _illusion_ of cordiality," Carlisle's voice shifted, warning and caution glazing over his silky voice, "before acting rashly." Carlisle meant him, Jasper knew, for certainly the principal of the sophisticated FORKS Academy would not allow himself to act rashly before a student—a lousy student, at that. _Rashly_. That was the adverb of his life. Edward _overthought_, Emmett was just plain senseless, while he was rash. As the idiom went, Carlisle had hit the nail on the head. Jasper's head hung in defeat, the whisper of pain ghosting over his arm in sly reminder.

But he couldn't admit this to the older man. "Alright, Mr. Cullen. Why don't you slap on a pointy hat, grow a gray beard, and call yourself a wise advisor?"

"I am not here to banter with you, Jasper, as disappointed as I know you are by this piece of news. As the principal of this academy, it is my duty to uphold its rules and unfortunately, it involves giving you the appropriate punishment for your actions, even if you are my son.

"Your first act of misconduct was when you left your dormitory after curfew. Furthermore, you roamed around campus in the dark, pretending to be an intruder. Then you broke Mr. Swan's office window and led him on a one-hour chase… That adds up to about fifteen demerits. But you didn't do this for fun, did you?"

Jasper shrugged innocently. "But I do love running so, Principal Cullen."

There was a slight curve to Carlisle's lips when he began, "Suppose I decide to pay a visit to Emmett and Edward's room right now…"

Again he shrugged, and all was hushed until he felt his ankle click against the leg of the chair in a sudden motion. "You don't know anything you think you know," he growled.

"This is a sign of insecurity and mistrust," Carlisle murmured to himself hastily, a crease deepening between his brows. "Why don't you tell me what I don't know then?" he asked, goading.

Jasper bit his lip until the skin pierced and bitter taste of blood slid down his throat in a snaky trail. "So you can analyze it like you just did? I'm a teenaged, not stupid. I don't trust you at all."

"Have I ever violated your trust in anyway?" he said politely, raising an inquisitive eyebrow.

"It's not you, it's me." Jasper delivered the words with a dramatic flair.

"Sometimes I wonder if it is 'you' rather than 'me'. How often do we really make the choices we make, without the influence of those around us since birth? If who we _are_ determines the choices that we make and the people and occurrences around us shape our character, does that mean that it is actually people and occurrences that make our choices for us? I can never tell how much freedom one can truly attain, without living in a certain isolation."

Unconvinced, Jasper sneered, "Well does that mean that, to a certain degree, _you_ are determining the choices that I make?"

"Perhaps it is so."

"I don't think you have enough influence on my _character_ to affect my choices," he pointed out, coldly, as Carlisle's face fell into darkness.

Sighing, the principal made his conclusion as though vastly disappointed in the student. "Very well. You will have detention cleaning the cafeteria after dinner every day for two months."

---

_Edward found Eleazar's tall, muscular frame blocking and darkening the slender doorway late that afternoon, after awakening from his fatigue-induced slumber through the daylight. He hadn't realized how drained of energy was when every fiber of his being was screaming for him to drive onward, away from FORKS, to Alaska. He knew an uncomfortable and painful conversation would follow his arrival even during the journey to Denali, though being allowed some rest first was unexpected._

"_How are Carlisle and Esme?" Eleazar began, almost hesitant. _At least he is breaking into this gently, _thought Edward with relief as he scanned the other's thoughts._

"_They are well as can be, I guess, with two daughters and three sons and an entire school to manage. Emmett has convinced himself that he and Rosalie are meant for each other though, I'm afraid." He chuckled at the thought of his two older siblings._

"_Alice is well? And Jasper?"_

_Edward nodded soundlessly, wincing in anticipation of what was to come._

"_What are you really doing here, Edward?" asked Eleazar, his gently accented voice somber and light as it overtook the atmosphere. "I truly doubt this is your idea of a 'vacation'."_

"_I'll become a threat—if I'm not one now—if I remain in FORKS any longer." He licked his dry, cracked lips reluctantly, waiting for a reply._

"_Because of this girl," the older boy, almost a man, stated, as if the fact was completely ludicrous._

"_Isabella Swan," Edward agreed, feeling small and powerless at the sight of Eleazar's penetrating golden eyes. "How'd you know?"_

"_Alice told me."_

"_Isn't having a sister that can see the future supposed to _benefit_ me?"_

_The strong lines of his face and his olive skin were vague against the dim light from the window, though Edward could see a touch of amusement in his features when he pushed locks of his thick dark hair back from his face. "That is absurd. She is but a simple girl." His straight nose may have been wrinkled in distaste._

"_Tell me something I don't know. I hate the way I lose control and become a monster when I am around her."_

_Eleazar's gaze, so like hardened gold and hot lava, was unwavering but Edward was trembling from its effects. "Then Edward, find the courage within yourself to actually seek control."_

The conversation between him and Eleazar replayed itself like a reel of neverending tape as Edward begrudgingly headed "home".

Snow touched the edges of the road like translucent strips of lace, glittering as the dim light of the car struck them. It was all so deadly quiet to him, unused to the scarcity of thoughts in this cold and barren land and feeling entangled in the tranquility of the land. What occupied his thoughts were his siblings—friends, left back in FORKS, and what may happen to them if proof that they aided him in his "escape" surfaced to the teachers.

Though he did not want to admit it at the time, he had known Eleazar was right all along. Perhaps all that he really needed to resolve this… "thing" between him and the Bella creature was some courage on his part to do the right things. He thought about the Bella creature, and how insignificant all of how he felt in her presence was against the white road stretching out before him like choices. And maybe he could actually find the trust and courage within himself to look her in the eye and speak.


	5. Chapter Four: Bella

_The F.O.R.K.S. Academy_

(**A Moderately Important Author's Note:** _Wondering why this chapter took so long? First of all, I've been swamped with work at school as the summer draws near and haven't had as much writing time as I ought to. But don't worry, I'll be a lot more active when school's out. Promise. The second reason is that because I was very dissatisfied with the last chapter, I went back and made the discussion between Jasper and Carlisle longer and less pointless and added a scene between Edward and Eleazar. Ok, go go go reread it now and I hope you enjoy this installment of FORKS! Seriously._)

**Chapter Four  
**_Bella_

"Look, it's snow!" Alice pointed out, snowflakes covering tufts of her short dark hair in swirls, enthusiastically during their walk to the main academy building where the cafeteria was located.

"No duh, Captain Obvious," said Rosalie, looking a little dazzled by the snow herself.

"We live in _Washington_, peoples, Rain City, USA. Of course there's going to be snow," Emmett asserted, smirking.

A thick layer of snow made a silvery finish over the academy paths and stretches of grass, glittering enigmatically as Edward followed the others, frantic. He was glad that no one except his siblings noticed that he had been missing for the entire weekend but the outcome felt grim nonetheless. Jasper now had punishment—for a month, because he was trying to help.

He had to admit, begrudgingly, that Eleazar was correct; he had no courage to take control of his own life, however wretched it was. And he supposed the right thing to do was to attempt to, at least, though he still hadn't an inkling about why Bella Swan had such a startling effect on him…

_She _is_ just another girl, after all_. "Emmett, Washington isn't a city. It's a state," he reminded the older boy, gently, as Rosalie raised an eyebrow wittily and Emmett appeared wounded. "Oh don't look at me like that."

"Like what?" Emmett pouted some more, exaggerating his bold features.

Edward whirled around swiftly when struck by a cold, wet ball of snow hurled at his face. Ominous music thundered in his mind. He wiped the mixture of snow and water from his face with his sleeve and turned to Jasper, who whistled innocently. "You tricked me."

"A simple redirection of thoughts is all," was Jasper's cool response.

"And the war begins…" Alice murmured, tragically, her hands quickly assembling snowballs of her own. Edward's lips quirked at what his sister was about to do.

"Alas—" Rosalie began to say before getting hit by Alice's huge snowball. The younger girl laughed at the sight of Rosalie's face smeared with white, powdery snow. Emmett dropped, ducked, and rolled away efficiently, only to be smacked in the back of the head by Jasper's snowball.

It was Edward's turn to take his revenge while his opponent was preoccupied. "Aughhh!" Jasper screamed when a _large_ snowball, a foot in diameter, was hurled at his face. "Damn you, Edward Cullen! Damn. _Youuuuuuuuuuuuuu_…"

Edward merely guffawed madly as Emmett's strong arms dragged him into a pile of snow, choking from the snow rushing into his open mouth. Alice was rolling on the ground, laughing at her brothers even though Rosalie was dumping heaps of snow on her repeatedly.

They were all laughing, creating music out of cold atmospheric air

Later, sitting grinning and shivering and soaking wet, Edward mocked, "Are you sure you want anything to eat, Jasper?" They sat at their customary lunch table again, taking small, cautious bites of the unidentified foods the stoic lunch ladies plopped onto their plates carelessly. He thought the main course was something that had once been lasagna, though it seemed to have gone through a lot since then, looking distasteful as an old, brownish mass resistant against Edward's metal fork.

Jasper eyed him suspiciously, then said, "Okay, I'll bite. Why wouldn't I want anything to eat, dear Edward?"

"Well, you ate enough snow during the snowball fight outside!" Edward cried, as the rest of the table roared with mirth.

"Says the person _sopping_ wet from being dragged into the snow," Jasper replied, unperturbed.

Alice changed the topic lest another snowball fight was started over such a pointless subject, "So how was Denali?"

"Little has changed," Edward admitted, slightly discomfited by the memory of his conversation with Eleazar. "Snow, snow, caribou, snow, snow, people," he murmured absently, paying little attention to his siblings now. There she was again, Bella Swan, glancing furtively at him from her place amongst the Lucky Seven. He closed his eyes broodingly.

"You look at her like you're hungry," Rosalie said quietly, golden eyes piercing through him. "And the way she's glancing back at you when she thinks we're not looking…" _Disgusting. Dishonest._

"Thank you for your opinion," he told her, his tone cutting._ Edward_, thought Alice warningly. _She's only being honest._ "I intend on resolving the matter today."

The older girl appeared impressed in spite of herself. Alice gave him a thumbs-up and he felt himself swell with pride tastelessly.

Edward felt Mike Newton's wary glare on the back of his skull. He wondered if he should feel threatened by the swirls of violent, jealous thoughts involving him getting brutally tortured in many creative and clichéd ways rotating through the boy's thoughts. Then it occurred to him: Mike Newton could not be a threat to him physically as he could anticipate every move he would make the second it popped into his head.

"I think Newton might be in love with you," Emmett said in a false whisper, leaning across the table carefully. "You and Isabella Swan both, since the two of you're all he is looking…"

"That's… flattering, but he'll be disappointed to know my sexual preference leans heavily towards the female sex," Edward told his brother, straight-faced.

Alice brightly entered the conversation with, "Not according to the walls in the boys' and girls' bathrooms you don't."

He sighed. "All rumors and lies. But Alice, how do you what are on the walls of the boys' bathroom?" She cocked an eyebrow. _A vision. Duh._ Edward was very thankful that the vision did not involve _him_ in the said bathroom.

It was during Biology with Mr. Banner that Edward managed to look at her without grains of self-loathing and hostility in his gaze. His hair was damp from the melted snow as he subconsciously ran his hand through it, leaving one hand free to balance his body on the edge of his seat. Afraid of what might happen if he got close to her but could not comprehend her thoughts, he sat as far as humanly possible away from her, trying to ignore the constraint of his sweater and the discomfort in his bones.

Nevertheless, he would talk to her still—he _must_ talk to her.

"Hello, Bella Swan, my name is Edward Cullen."

She looked up reluctantly from the cover of her notebook, confusion shuffled into the soft brown of her eyes. Yes, of course she would be utterly baffled, he said to himself. After all, why would someone who had previously acted a complete ass suddenly speak with a certain degree of cordiality? Her downcast eyes almost physically pained him for he could not acquire the unseen thoughts that made a pair with her countenance. "You know my name?"

He laughed nervously, wondering to himself how on earth he was going to explain this one. "You are—quite popular these days, so you shouldn't act so surprised."

"But my name is Isabella Swan," she said softly, a mystery for him to solve.

"Oh—sorry, I'd thought you might prefer—do you go by Isabella?" he stuttered, flushing.

"No, it's just that nobody had thought to call me Bella here before."

"Oh. I merely _knew_ you would prefer Bella…" He couldn't speak anymore, all the thoughts and words in his mind frozen in their tracks. "Shall I begin the experiment?" he asked, changing the subject quickly.

"I can start it if you want." She was blushing.

Now he knew he had all the control he needed. He had carried some sort of conversation with her successfully. It was awkward certainly, but he decided to blame it on the fact that they were teenagers. He _could_ speak to her without unleashing horrific consequences because of his ability or rather its lack thereof if he wanted, and he felt stronger for it. "As you wish," he finally said, confident for the first time in a long while.

He was marveling at the victory of the situation when Bella looked up from the microscope, staring him straight in the eye as she declared, "Prophase."

_Prophase. What a lovely word._ She was obviously thought she was proficient at Biology, but Edward knew he was better from past experience doing partner labs. "Really? May I look again?" He caught her hand when she started taking the slide out of the microscope and he flinched, breathing ragged. Her skin felt warm in his hand as thought he was grasping sunlight or something forbidden. "I apologize," he murmured to her, seeing out of the corner of the eye that she was as startled as he. Then swiftly, he glanced at the slide through the microscope to say, "Prophase." _Perhaps she really is proficient._

He helped himself to the next slide. Before recording it, he simply stated, "Anaphase."

"Do you mind…?" He shrugged wryly and allowed her a turn on the microscope. "Can I do slide three?" she inquired, sounding satisfied, like she was the one who could read minds.

They were finished with the experiment promptly, though afterwards the teacher, Mr. Banner, had given them some strange looks at their unnatural speed. "So tell me about yourself? You came from Arizona, correct?"

She nodded shyly, a pale blush lying beneath her beautiful exterior, compelling him too dangerously. She was prey to him, the predator, and he was frightened suddenly by how much of a vice she was becoming to him. And what a threat he was becoming to her… he repressed a rush of aching memories overcoming him. "I guess I'm not really used to the cold yet. Or the wet and snowy, for that matter."

"I suppose I'm not hazarding a guess when I say that you're not disappointed about the snow melting?" he teased. "Why did you come to the Academy, then, if this is such a difficult place for you?"

Bella seemed shocked that he would ask her straight out like that, without any hint of mockery and machinations. "My mother got remarried last September to Phil, who plays ball for a living and travels a lot," she said. "And that's when things got complicated."

"You guys have to move around a lot, and your mother sent you here so that she could travel with him," he assumed, measuring the ephemeral expressions on her face in his mind.

"Your _assumption_ isn't true," she told him.

She baffled him. All he wanted to do right then was scan her thoughts for clarity. "What do you mean?"

His already piqued interest rose even more when she sighed, apparently exasperated at his curiosity. "You just made an assumption about something you barely know anything apart."

"Yes, I believe I am familiar with the definition of the term 'assumption'." Edward grinned crookedly, to her chagrin.

"How would you like it if I just _assumed_ you're some gay, emo faux-hipster guy?" she suggested.

"Why would you think that?" he said, frowning, though the curiosity was still apparent in his eyes.

She smiled and listed, "Cashmere sweater, neat hair, sensitive but sulking demeanor."

"Cashmere sweaters are _classic_, but I see your point." He saluted her with a slight nod of the head. "Touché."

"_I_ sent myself to spend some quality time with Charlie. She looked so unhappy because she couldn't be with Phil while staying with me…" she explained. Her voice was laced with so much glumness and sadness that Edward could not help but meet her tender gaze sympathetically.

"You would rather be unhappy than to see your mother unhappy," he stated.

"That's the end of my story," she finished humorlessly.

Mr. Banner was scrawling something on the blackboard but it was not at the teacher that Edward's attention was diverted at, left hand holding his chin in a pensive manner. "Yet deep down inside you are suffering and you won't let anyone see it." Too late did he notice how bizarre he would seem to her.

"My mother always calls me her open book, my face is so easy to read." She smiled, just for him, just this time. The lesson Mr. Banner was teaching them was a blur to him at this point. "_You're_ reading me like an open book."

"You have no idea how excruciating hard this has been," he replied to her, vaguely amused.

---

"Emmett, do you want to like, go out with me this weekend?"

Emmett blinked as he contemplated his prospects, his thumbs hooked on to the belt loops of his jeans thoughtfully. All the students were gradually leaving their classrooms at the last bell of the day when what's-her-name, the girl, cornered him in the main hallway, as hopeful as he himself was when he decided to ask Rosalie out. "I thought the whole school knows who I like," he said dumbly, slightly stunned by the boldness that shone from the girl's eyes like a desert mirage from the heat of the sun.

She, in turn, asked him, "So? What if I know who you like?"

_Yeah, so why would you decide to ask someone who likes someone else out, you little idiot?_ Emmett said to her mentally. "Don't you think I'd say no? After all, it's obvious I don't like you in that way." _Or in any way, for that matter right now._ He had been asked out enough times before, but never like _this_, forcefully, delusional.

"No, you won't say no because you're not going out with Rosalie. She won't have you," the girl sneered, though Emmett was really more bothered by the fact that he couldn't recall her name since FORKS was such a close-knitted school… She was quite tall and pretty, but nowhere near the pedestal Rosalie stood on in his mind.

He came right out and bluntly said to the irritating girl, "I don't even know who you are! There's no way in hell I want to go out with you."

"And why not?" Her voice bordered on dangerous as her silky-smooth words of threat danced a passage into Emmett's consciousness.

"Look, no offense to you even though you're really kind of an annoying girl, I don't want to go out with anyone except Rosalie." He wanted to knock some sense into the girl, who plain old refused to "get it".

"Oh darn. I guess I'll be forced to tell Principal Cullen that his darling children broke like a billion school rules to sneak Edward out of the Academy last weekend…" she revealed quietly.

The clamoring footsteps of the students and the thunderous slams of locker doors barely covered the deafening rumble in Emmett's heart. "What are you _talking_ about, damn it?"

"Drop the dumb act. You know what I'm talking about." The girl's fingertips brushed his chest in a dangerously light caress, meeting Emmett's wide eyes just once, briefly, to allow him to see the ruthless beauty in the pools of her gaze.

"_Noooo_, if I _knew_ what you were talking about, I wouldn't be asking you, would I?"

"Fine, here's a little something to remind you then." She pulled a pink (not just any pink, _an offensively_ hot_ pink_, thought Emmett) mobile phone from the pocket of her too-tight, designer jeans. "I bet you don't have like, a hot cell phone like this one. It even _takes videos_."

Emmett had never been so tempted to slap a female in the face, and with his strength, he could probably slap her face off her head and there would be nothing left there to bother him.

"Okay, your parents give you too much money and you enjoy filming questionable videos on your ugly cell phone. I get that." He couldn't rein in his anger at this girl. She was so… bitchy and preppy. A more sensible part of himself reminded him gently that Rosalie had a cell phone like that, only red, but he knew she was above this _Barbie_, deep down inside. Would he like her as much as he did if she was?

"Oh, check out this really, really fab clip I got really like late last night." She flipped open the phone gracefully and stuck it before Emmett's eyes. "I took it while I was looking out the window at night, y'know."

He shivered beneath his skin from something other than the cold temperature. What showed up on the previously blank screen of the streamlined device was Edward's vehicle, with a clear view of Edward's face in the window, driving through the front entrance of the academy, its engines humming tranquilly in the silence.

Blackmail. That was what her intention was when she first approached him. He attempted to speak, but the disgust he had for his stupidity and her malice that his angry words gagged him like a cloth as he recovered.

Blanching, he demanded, "What do you want with me, then? You obviously don't think I'm so great and nor I you. Why do you even want to go out with me?"

"The problem is that I _do_ think you're pretty great," she said demurely. She took the phone away from his face and closed it loudly.

"I'm not Edward," he said quietly. "That's who you want to go out with you, right? We're brothers, but that's when our common interests end."

"I know that, but he's not the reason I'm doing this, even though he rejected me."

"Then its popularity?" he guessed. "You're dying to beat Rosalie. And how much more embarrassing would it be for her if her own brother sided with you."

She smiled, revealing white teeth and deadly cruelty. "I knew you weren't totally dumb. This is like a one of those awesome 'two birds with one stone' plans. Since we'll be together all the time, I can also make sure Bella Swan doesn't get Edward if I can't. And you can't tell anyone because then I'll get Edward expelled. Principal Cullen can't exactly go _easy_ on his son, now can he?"

"You're a nasty piece of work," Emmett growled, though he really meant "You fucking piece of shit" or something equally explicit. Neither of them spoke a syllable next. The hallways emptied as students exited the school building for the final time that day. "Since we're 'going out', shouldn't I know your name?"

"You can call me Lauren."

---

Edward pushed the door to the main school building open enthusiastically, glad for his classes to be finished for the day. He walked through the door and stopped at the right side of the doorway, waiting as Alice, Emmett, Rosalie, and Jasper too exited the building. The untainted snow drifting from the heavens earlier that day had weakened into a minor rain that left paths of water across his white skin. He recalled the natures of _passion_, beginning as pure and chaste and powerful as snow itself and somehow dwindling into a rain, softer and kinder but no less essential to the world.

He repressed a gasp when he saw Bella Swan, separated from him by a glass door and three students. Their eyes met precariously through what divided them, golden versus warm brown. She walked absently in the crowd, paying little attention to her surroundings but for Edward.

Edward let out a cry of warning, but she did not notice the door was closed when she attempted to walk through the doorway, hitting her forehead on glass and metal firmly.

_So fragile. What will she do with no one there to protect her?_ Edward then thought, and laughed irrepressibly until he fled the scene of the crime.


End file.
